July 13/07 12:08 pm - Cascade Cycling Classic: Stages 1 and 2

Stage 1 of the Cascade Cycling Classic began with an aggressive start with an early break of 8 riders escaping from the main field. The breakaway riders represented all the major general classification teams, so in order to have the main bunch take up the chase, the Navigators sent Tour de Beauce champion Ben Day up the road. The breakaway gained a time advantage on the main field of nearly 8 minutes prompting Toyota-United and Priority Health to take up the chase.

The Navigators came to the front for the first KOM at 100km in order to raise the pace, which prompted BMC to take the helm and aggressively chase the break. The time gap between the break and the peloton began to rapidly drop, but was still holding steady at 2 minutes with 15km to go. The Navigators were in the hunt for a Zajicek win, so the team took to the front in order to bring the break back.

The efforts of the Navigators spelled doom for the breakaway riders which was reeled in with 1.5km to go on the finishing climb to Pilot Butte. Parkpre's Ricardo Escuela and Navigators Phil Zajicek attacked the field and went clear for the finish. Toyota-United's Chris Baldwin decisively caught the two within the last kilometer, and the trio raced towards the finish.

The three-man sprint finish would end with Escuela taking the win followed by Baldwin and Zajicek.

Stage 2, not unlike stage 1, began aggressively, and within the first 10 kilometers of the stage, Navigators' Glen Chadwick and Priority Health's Scott Zwizanski attacked the main field and gained a massive 6 minute advantage on the pack. Stage 1 winner Ricardo Escuela's Successful Living squad took up the chase of the duo, and as the road went downhill, the gap fell rapidly. Successful Living took the gamble, and expended reserved energy to bring the gap down to 2 minutes.

With the time gap reduced, Toyota-United took up the chase and reduced the gap further to 1 minute right before the KOM; however three riders burst out of the main field and bridged the gap to the breakaway duo setting off alarm bells within the main bunch. The three escapees were Navigators rider Matt Cooke, Kodak's Ray Trebon, and BMC's David Vitoria. Navigators' David Rodriguez attempted to escape and bridge the gap to Cooke and company, but was quickly reeled in by the Toyota-United led pack.

The duo had now become a sizeable force of five, but was quickly under pressure when Zwizanski flatted, prompting Cooke and Chadwick to push the pace of the break increasing the time gap back to the main field. With a 90 second advantage the break powered up the climb, but with Zwizanski out of the mix, Priority Health took up the chase along with Toyota-United spelling doom for the four man break, and with sight of 5km to go, all but Vitoria were reabsorbed back into the main field, who too was quickly reeled in soon after.

As the main field entered the final kilometers of the race, several small attacks tried to break free of the main field with Navigators Phil Zajicek giving an attack a go with Health Net's Jeff Louder and two BMC riders, but at 600m from the line, the Zajicek initiated attack was nullified. Priority Health's Ben-Jacques Maynes would not let the only rider between him and the finish line go, and at 300m to go, Maynes overtook Toyota-United's Chris Baldwin for the win.